


dum videt inferos

by Quillori



Category: Shadowscapes Tarot
Genre: Gen, M/M, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-26 19:44:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17147966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quillori/pseuds/Quillori
Summary: The Knight of Wands returns home, journeying by day and night. Journeys end, they say, in lovers' meetings, but the journey by night is quite different, and much harder, than that by day.





	dum videt inferos

**Author's Note:**

  * For [shadow_lover](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadow_lover/gifts).



>   
> _He has managed to steal one of the swords that the Swan Guardian oversees. He thinks the Guardian is oblivious, but she is in fact watching him with one eye…. he is the cleverest Blackbird to have been able to draw this Sword from the Stone._

There was the usual problem with lodging. Everyone else was happy to find their own boltholes (even if half the time they turned up in Rufus's bed part way through the night), but that was hardly practical for Tau, and no horse would stay in a stable with him, even had he consented to spend the night in one himself. But the human occupants found in most inns tended to think the horses had the right of it, and were no happier about sharing a roof with something that might consider them a tasty light supper. In the end, Rufus had to pay rather more than he could spare to for them to have the inn to themselves (it was an unfortunately large, well-appointed inn), and even at that, they were served dinner by the innkeeper himself, his family and servants having refused to set foot in the place.

Later, counting through his sadly depleted store of coins, he found three new dirimhis and a small but beautifully worked pendant. Karini, he presumed, doing her best to help out. It would be nice to think she’d made it performing tricks in the marketplace, or had it as payment for some service she’d performed, but he couldn’t really make himself believe it.

Tau was already asleep, one paw possessively on the little chest they’d brought back. Three year’s journey, into lands whose very names were unfamiliar, lands so strange and disconcerting he’d begun to doubt (he who had never been unsure of anything, least of all himself). Was he mad? Was he in truth dead? Enchanted? Were all his memories false, and clouds of golden fishes had always flocked through the sky, swirling and diving like birds? Had trees faces? Did they always reach up like claws from the ground, holding houses aloft? But he was home now, or very nearly, the ground beneath his feet solid and familiar, and were he to look out the window there would be nothing to see but clouds and the night sky. 

The bed was solid and familiar too, the style he was used to, with plain linen sheets, not the hammocks and divans and mats and nests of the last three years. He should be looking forward to sleeping in it. He was looking forward to it. But Tau was stretched out in front of the remains of the fire, warm and even more familiar, and the bed was cold. Better to curl up against him. Better to sleep without dreaming.

The morning, they say, is wiser than the night. Certainly it is more optimistic. It could have been any of a thousand mornings when he had ridden out, hunting deer with a pack of his father’s hounds running before him. A villager, braver than the rest, waved at him as he passed, and he waved back, smiling. Three weeks till he was back; only a week if he took the mountain road. His sister would be waiting, his friends - he could already imagine their greetings. By the time he reached the foot of the pass, he was already imaging where he might go next, new journeys, new adventures, an entire world stretching before him, let him only be freed of the burden he carried.

There was a faint hissing sound ahead of him, somewhere further up the path, so quiet he wouldn’t have heard it had he not been keeping half an ear out for it, and a brief clatter, as though something large had dislodged a stone, sending it tumbling down the hillside. Rufus grinned to himself and settled his wand more comfortably in his hand. This was the life: the warm summer sun, and a proper dragon to fight, not the airy, ethereal semi-divine creatures he’d come to know, which fought not with teeth and claws but with words and riddles, spells and prophecies. A homely, pass-guarding dragon, earthbound and looking for an easy meal. Well, it would be in for a surprise. 

Tau didn’t even bother to get involved. Perhaps he thought the exercise would be good for Rufus; perhaps he was just feeling lazy. Griselda ran forward ahead of them all, zigzagging madly between the dragon’s six legs, snapping at the soft undersides of its feet whenever it raised them, and darting effortlessly aside whenever it lashed at her. Moments later she was joined by Rohit and Renny, one grey and two red blurs weaving a complicated pattern that had confused far cleverer beasts, their sharp, triumphant yelps almost drowning out the dragon’s hisses. 

Rufus murmured the words of the enchantment that sharpened the edge of his wand to a spear point, able to piece even dragonhide. His aim was legendary, and though the wand looped back to his hand at once, there was no need for a second throw. The villager who had waved at him would be pleased: dragons didn’t move around much in summer, having found and fought over hunting grounds soon after they woke from hibernation, so it was likely the pass would remain safe at least until the following spring. 

Karani and Minhyi had dashed up to join the rest: just because they preferred to sit and watch the fight didn’t mean they were prepared to forgo their share of the dragon’s tongue. Even Tau bestirred himself, slashing open the side of the dragon with one effortless swipe, and crouching to delicately extract the heart.

The pass was high enough the nights were cold, even in summer, and they were grateful to curl up all together for warmth. Still, there were monsters other than dragons, and besides it was habit by now to set a watch. Rohit woke him sometime in the depth of the night, a cold muzzle pressing against his neck and four cold paws on his chest. Rufus sunk his hands in Rohit’s thick dark fur for a moment, stroking him affectionately, then reluctantly extracted himself from the warm pile of bodies and settled himself on a nearby rock.

"I wonder what I shall do next?"

Rufus didn’t bother to look round. There was no one there, certainly no one real. 

"What’s in that chest of yours? You shouldn’t keep secrets: it doesn’t suit you."

Rufus continued to stare out into the darkness. He could just make out the treetops, a faint line against the almost starless sky.

"Maybe you don’t know yourself? _I_ know." The man who wasn’t there gave a sharp, rattling trill of laughter. "What good is locking something if you don’t have the key?"

Since there was no one there, there was no point in looking, and no point in replying. He would just sit here in silence, keeping watch, and in the end it would be dawn. Surely in the end it would be dawn.

"Kfiri! Look at me Kfiri!"

It was Tau’s pet name for him, but not said with Tau’s rumbling, affectionate tone, which drew it out: Kfirrrrrri. This was harsh, staccato, more like an alarm call than a sign of affection. Rufus risked a glance at Tau and the foxes: they were sleeping undisturbed. And what should disturb them, since there was no one here? But if there was no one, it didn’t matter which way he looked, did it? And to keep watch, you should really look everywhere. It was amazing how many excuses he could come up with. So why delay the inevitable? (That was another excuse.)

"I knew you could look at me if you wanted to. And look what I have."

Rufus made an abortive grab for the key, before he remembered he was dreaming, and also that he had never once bested Pitu in a wrestling match. The key, unnaturally bright, gleaming in the non-existent moonlight, was waved tauntingly at him, and then it vanished away: what Pitu had done with it, who could say. Rufus had never figured out any of his slights of hand either. 

It was ridiculous. Pitu should look weak, delicate: a small, fluttering thing among sleek carnivores. He didn’t. He looked lithe and powerful, and altogether too sure of himself. 

"You’re not even human" - which was a silly thing for Rufus to blurt out. What did it matter what Pitu had or had not been? And also, he wasn’t here to be talked to. It was important to remember that. Rufus was increasingly worried that one night he would forget, and then what would happen?

Pitu - no, not Pitu, but the non-existent dream image of Pitu - grinned at him, sharp and mocking and almost, in his way, affectionate - exactly, impossibly like the real thing. "You think you are? You keep strange company, Kfiri, for a human. Why trouble yourself about me?"

It was impossible to explain. He’d tried, in the past. Tried to explain his vows, and the correct order of things, how it must be respected, and how he’d sworn to keep that order, everything in its proper place, fulfilling its proper role. But if he was being honest with himself, he wasn’t sure he truly cared anymore. Pitu was Pitu. It was unnecessary, and probably counterproductive, to assign him a genus and a label. Let him be human or not, as he chose. Only, of course, there were some things he mustn’t be allowed to choose, some transgressions too great to be forgiven.

Pitu had always been able to read him like an open book. "That again? You have a wand; I have a sword. What’s wrong with that? Finders, keepers."

"You know what’s wrong," Rufus almost shouted, remembering the others and muting his voice to a whisper just in time. "You can’t have that sword. Even I couldn’t have it, and I’m one of the chosen knights. You’ll upset the balance. We already have an emperor. You don’t care about anyone but yourself. You don’t even know how to use it." He was aware he wasn’t even trying to convince Pitu anymore, just spitting the arguments out one after another in a familiar, useless litany.

"Of course I can have it. I took it. That makes it mine. Anyway," Pitu said consoling, "there’s six more of them still stuck in that stone. Can’t they balance things enough?. Why begrudge me one?" 

He walked over and sat beside Rufus, cocking his head and looking at him speculatively. Rather, Rufus thought, like a bird looks at a worm. Rufus wished desperately he could see Pitu's eyes, but the mask was, as always, in the way, hiding his eyes in shadow, two darker patches above the cruel curve of the beak. Did he wear the mask to hide himself, Rufus wondered, or to reveal?

"You worry too much, Kfiri. You didn’t used to." The words were gentle, but there was something avid about his mouth, something sharp and hungry that reminded Rufus uncomfortably of Tau eating the dragon’s heart. Once, Pitu would have reached out to tousle his hair. Once, his touch would not have burned like ice.

Rufus looked away, back at the trees, and tried to think of something that wasn’t burning, that wasn’t flames and charred feathers and ash.

"One sword, one kingdom. The balance is still there. Why can’t you reconcile yourself to it? You could stay with me. A king can have a knight."

He wasn’t going to think about it. He wasn’t going to remember the acrid smoke, the stench of burning flesh, the blinding light, the felt but unseen beating of great wings. Had it been a swan or a phoenix? And afterwards ... the blackened land, his blistered hands streaked with soot, the air clogged with ash, drifting down like snow. He wanted to tell Pitu it was all wrong, that nobody wanted to be king of that kingdom, that he’d been enough for Rufus as he was: not a king, not even a knight, just clever, unreliable, light-fingered, light-hearted Pitu.

"I’m not staying anywhere." When had his voice become so hopeless? "I’m bringing you home. It’s the least I can do for your family, and the last thing I can do for you."

Pitu leant forward, so close they were almost touching. So close it would have been easy to reach out and touch his dark wings, to lift the mask from his face. "How many times do I have to tell you? You can’t bury me when I’m still here."

It would be so very easy to touch him, so very easy to give in, to give up. What after all was the point of going back only for a funeral - nothing but more ash scattered on the wind? Except, Pitu never said one thing plain when he could imply two at once, meaning masking meaning. And there was something he had to remember, something he had sworn to do. Dawn. He had to wait for dawn, night after night, all the way home. "I won’t leave you behind," he’d said once, young and careless and sure of himself. "I’d follow you anywhere," he’d said, "anywhere in the nine realms, and the heavens, and into death itself, and bring you back safely". And now he had to do it, now he was older and understood doubt, and fear, now when he didn’t have the easy certainty of youth, now when he had nothing but Pitu’s equivocal smile and the memory of an old story. But it would be dawn soon, and he could wait out another night.


End file.
